Pictures from the Vasona Picnic

[VBMWMO]

Yesterday was the 24th edition of the Alex Silverio Memorial Picnic at Vasona Park in Los Gatos, CA. I meant to take some pictures, but instead must rely on the photos taken by Marc Hyman:

http://www.snafu.org/saturday/2007/vasona/

Also, over on the BMW MOA forum, are these photos and writeup. I'm not sure if you can see this if you're not an MOA member.

It was a lovely day, and we had a lot of nice bikes show up. The swap meet portion was pretty thin. OTOH, there were a pair of Norton riders from England on a 12 week US tour who happened to hear about the picnic and came down.

My excuse for not taking any photos was that I was busy cooking. We cooked up pork tenederloin cutlets, sausages and chicken breasts on the grill, garlic bread, salad, a pot of chili, potato salad and watermelon. Joel Hansen, the organizer, brought bags of oranges fresh of his tree in Marin county.

Unfortunately, my newly finished R51/3 failed me on the ride over. I was at the bottom of a long hill, just before the exit for the picnic, when one cylinder stopped running very suddenly. My immediate thoughts about what it might be were all very bad, and I managed to get to a friend's house, who lives closer than the picnic. His wife graciously dropped me off at the park.

After the picnic, I was relieved to find that the problem was extremely simple in nature. The /3 throttle has a small traveler piece inside that pulls the throttle cables. One side had broken and released the left throttle cable. Still, the bike had to go home in the truck...